The time has unquestionably come for us to develop not only more commerce with South America but also more intelligent relations with our southern neighbors. Most of us are much more ignorant about their history and politics than we care to admit. There is an increasing demand for trustworthy books on these subjects and the question arises as to whether it can be met. Is the field a profitable one for research, and is it possible with our available resources to undertake the production of scholarly works? It is the aim of this paper to answer these questions and to indicate the whereabouts of some of the more important collections of manuscript and printed sources, particularly those that are accessible in this country.

The basis for the paper is the author's card catalogue in the Yale Library, which includes among many others the titles of books relating to South America that are now in the Harvard Library, the Library of Congress, and the Yale Library. It is planned to make,this catalogue a subject index of material relating to Spanish America. At present it contains about 25,000 cards.